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the mystical underpinnings of most philosophies. I may find I want to learn and practice it. I have no expectations and they are not really important. I will know when the time is right if it is something I want to study or something I don't. Either way, life will go on, the world will turn, and change will happen. Not a lot of people (except me) will care what I read or what I learn from it, to be frank. And that's ok.

Whatever we read, learn, practice, etc. it is not to improve others, it is to improve ourselves. We often get that mixed up. "I am going to learn this so I can 'save the world' or 'teach it something special'." Oh, if only that were true. My learnings have been that only when we improve ourselves, not our wives, not our cousins, not our grouchy uncle or in-laws, do we improve the world.

And there are other New Age Religions and schools of thought. Though many offer excellent pragmatic practices to work on the body, soul, spirit (though I do not practice the religion of Buddhism, for instance, I am impressed with it introducing us to incorporating the body, along with the mind and spirit, as even modern medicine seems to agree they are all interconnected, and yoga, meditation, etc. seems to help many no matter what their religion, or if they have none at all.

Other than the aforementioned religions, though I certainly cannot berate anything "New Age" as I have seen such programs help many people, I have reached a conclusion after studying (and even practicing) some of them, there really is nothing new but the words and interpretations and sometimes those are lacking.

If I have "a beef" with anything New Age, it is the ones we have seen cropping up since the 1960's that usually come and go after the founder has made his dollars, that teaches us if "we wish something and pray hard enough for it we will get it. That is a bit transparent to me, though very common and it appears a new one crops up every half-decade ago with beautiful glossy brochures, slick videos, and great testimonials from "people we trust" (who were paid big-time for their contribution to "the cause". We are likely to see many more of those in our lifetime, simply because they are attractive and popular. But I could hardly call them "anything new". The one's I have seen are copies of everything from EST to a dozen of others long before this century.

But I think it is a good culture for people who want fellowship, and happen to have a belief in their God (which I tend to think

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